This is what I see

This is what I see. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

I look out into my garage, and I see what’s depicted above.
A single car occupying a two-car garage with one slot empty.
No longer are two cars in there, the cars my wife and I drove.
A 2003 Honda CR-V SUV, and a 2005 All-Wheel-Drive Toyota Sienna minivan. (The CR-V was also All-Wheel-Drive.)
My wife died of cancer almost a year ago. Ever since I’ve thought two cars for only one person was silly.
I really liked the CR-V, but it was 10 years old, and not very dog-friendly.
There’s no dog-swallowing gap behind the front seats, but folded-up the rears block the rear-door entrance. A dog has to jump around the folded-up seats, and my dog has fallen.
Both the Honda and the Toyota were bought new, yet my newer car is a 2012 Ford Escape, “pre-owned.” (“Doncha mean ‘used?’”)
I couldn’t dicker on this car; it was like buying a new previous Escape — only 2,800 miles.
Supposedly it was bought new by a guy who soon died, then sold back to the dealer.
I don’t like the new Escape, and the previous Escape is the dog-friendliest SUV I’ve ever seen.
An SUV is great for chasing trains. SUVs have a lot of under-clearance, and are usually All-Wheel-Drive, both of which I need.
I attended my GriefShare last night, and a friend was there who lost her husband over a year ago.
“I understand completely,” she said. “It’s hard to see your mate’s car go.
My husband’s butt sat in that driver-seat,” she said. “That was his car. He specced it, he ordered it, and he bought it.”
“Excuse me if I start crying,” I said to the salesman as he went about delivering my car. (I didn’t.)
I looked at the CR-V one last time. How many times did I drive that thing to Altoona and Horseshoe Curve?
Once we drove it all the way back from a railfan excursion in West Virginia, all in one day, a trip I’d never attempt again.
I’m old, and it burned me out.
I looked at the van. How many times did I cart my wife to Strong Hospital in Rochester for cancer treatments? Her last drive alive to hospice was in that van. She was so weak we had to wheel her in in a wheelchair.
The moving finger having writ moves on.

• Horseshoe Curve (the “Mighty Curve”), west of Altoona (“al-TUNE-uh;” as in the name “Al”), PA, is by far the BEST railfan spot I have ever been to. The railroad was looped around a valley to climb the mountains without steep grades. Horseshoe Curve was opened in 1854, and is still in use. I am a railfan, and have been since age-two (I’m 69). The viewing-area is smack in the apex of the Curve; and trains are willy-nilly. Up-close-and personal. —I’ve been there hundreds of times, since it’s only about five hours away.